A New Sort of Grace
by Dark Caustic
Summary: Maybe angels are rather genderless and don't go through heat and rut, but now Cas is human is he is unmistakably beta. And now he's a beta in heat.


Teaching Cas to be human is a little harder than Dean anticipated.

Yeah, he expected most of it. Expected having to remind Cas that he needed food and water and to bathe and teaching him how to shave.

Expected having to remind him that stoves are hot and knifes are sharp and he should probably not do anything stitches-worthy again. Can't just flash-heal now, buddy.

He expected the bouts of insomnia and depression that came with his new graceless state. Expected the temporary grief of having to travel by car and learn human weapons since angel-zapping is no longer an option. Was even ready to tackle the duel relief/regret of not having a direct line to heaven hardwired into his skull.

However, Dean still finds himself surprised every time he has to say things he never thought he'd have to tell a grown-ass adult.

"No, you can't befriend bees."

And, "Eight ounces of water. Four times a day. No, it's not too much. Would you just listen to me?"

Even, "Yes, _that _is what toilet paper is for."

His personal favorite, "You need to change clothes every day. Well, fine _most_ days," he amended after the fallen angel pointed out that even he doesn't change clothes every day.

But none of these even registered on the new level of difficulty in teaching Cas the ways of humans that Dean stumbled face first into this evening.

Returning home from scouting out a mostly harmless haunting (refuses to do too much hunting while nursing Cas into humanity) he finds himself muddling through a mouth-watering smell that reeks across the whole house.

Upon investigation, he finds the kitchen empty – not even an open can lying out on the counter top. It's when he realizes the A/C is cranked up to eleven that the smell is not a something but a _someone_ and it hits Dean so hard in the chest he actually has to lean against the wall and fight to keep his body under control.

Cause his body? So digs that smell. Wants a piece of it. A taste of it. Wants to drink it down deep and…

_Fuck_.

Dean didn't even think to ask, yet alone set up precautions, for… for this situation.

Now there is no question. None at all.

Maybe angels are rather genderless and don't go through heat and rut, but now Cas is human is he is unmistakably beta.

And now he's a beta in heat.

The alpha in Dean raises it's head and sets a low rumble through his bones, ups his pheromones (should've gotten Cas on some suppressants, but, really, trying to convince the man to brush his fucking teeth took precedent over figuring out what getup he had in his pants) and… and.

Okay.

Dean is a decent guy. The kind of guy who doesn't have to listen to his instincts. As much as he wants to rush up the stairs and slam Cas into a wall and have his _dirtygloriousdelicious_ way with him, he is so not that kind of alpha.

He steps outside onto the porch for a moment to take a few non-beta scented breathes before going back inside to handle this.

Cas is plastered to his baby-blue sheets with sweat. His face flushed and hair matted, soaked through. The smell of him overwhelms Dean the moment he opens the door, flooding his mouth with slick saliva, encouraging the blood that isn't going south to roar in his ears.

Cas is stripped down to his underwear and a t-shirt, both of them now only patched with dry splotches, and Dean knows it's _more than sweat_ keeping those cotton boxers clinging to his skinny waist and thighs. Vaguely, Dean registers those were his shorts once and that makes his skin fit a little more snug than he'd like to own up to.

He's grunting, little huffs of discomfort by arousal Dean knows from getting more than one beta that worked up in his time. But it's about a thousand times more sweet falling out of the petals of the ex-angel's lips.

And his _hips_. Dean has to remind himself that he is Cas's friend and he's not going to bend him over the bed and knot him like their lives depend on it. Even as Cas's hips rise and fall against nothing, in perfect time to his grunts and Dean knows for certain that is the hottest thing he's ever witnessed.

A thousand or so hours of porn be damned.

After a moment or too of Dean trying to convince his body not to react to Cas's state (and not really succeeding, but, hey, it's biology, right?) Cas finally opens his eyes.

The pupils blown huge, the blue seeming to glint brighter then ever. He gasps, "Dean? Dean, what's-," grinds his hips down on nothing, throws his head back to expose his throat in such a submissive looking arch that Dean accidently growls, low and deep in his throat. "What's happening to me?" Cas finally manages to choke out.

That's what gets Dean off the _must fuck _train and back on the _help a friend_ track. He clears his throat. Can already feel his face flushed hot and his cock is really, really into this show, but, come on. Cas is still basically a _kid_ in a lot of regards and he can't just take advantage of him.

After swallowing the desert in his mouth (he doesn't remember eating sand, but he doesn't remember a lot of things right now), he answers his writhing friend, "You're in heat."

Cas stares at him, startled and desperate till he manages to still his auto-pilot hips. "Heat?" he repeats, dumbstruck. Like the synapses in his brain aren't lined up and he can't make sense of the word.

"Yeah," Dean says, staying firmly planted in the doorway where he can still get the occasional gust of non-beta scented air into his chest like that's the only thing keeping him from going completely feral and alpha-toppy all over Cas.

"What does…," Cas gives up on that sentence with an extra loud grunt. "Make it stop."

"I can't," Dean admits, tongue sticking to the roof of his mouth.

Cas whines. Like a fucking puppy. A desperate, high, broken sort of noise. "Please. Dean. I can't take it," he mutters. "You have to help me."

And yeah, Dean wants to help, really, he does, but he can't just…

Fuck. This is not going to be a fun conversation.

He scratches his hair and stares down at the warping of the wooden floorboards. "You're going to have to touch yourself," he says. So quietly and flatly that Cas misses it completely.

"What?"

Dean still refuses to look at him, but says a little louder, "You're going to have to touch yourself."

"Dean, I don't understand," Cas says and gives a bitten off whine again.

Dean takes a tiny step back. All the blood in his body is pooling down south or locked up in his face and being saturated in beta pheromones is not helping the issue.

"Don't leave," Cas begs at Dean's slight retreat. "Please, please don't leave me like this, Dean. Please. I need… something. Please don't go. Please."

Dean meets his eyes this time. All that arousal and confusion and… and _pain_. Fuck. His friend his all kinds of hurt and lost and… and, "I'm not going to leave you," Dean promises.

"Please, Dean," Cas says the words again like he didn't even hear him.

And okay. Okay.

Dean takes a deep breath, holds it and finally crosses the threshold to Cas's bedroom.

Cas looks a little less hurt when Dean sits on the edge of his bed and doesn't notice when he has to adjust his pants to keep himself, well, all comfortable.

Cas's hand shoots out and latches onto Dean's wrist. Fever-hot and slick with sweat, skin on skin and that does _so not help_ Dean keep his cool. He manages to swallow back an undefined noise, but his face gets even hotter and feels the first drip of moisture in his own boxers.

"It's okay, you're okay," Dean assures him, shifts slightly to put his free hand in Cas's hair and pushes the sweaty locks off his forehead.

Cas makes a grateful whimper and looks up at Dean with so much need that it takes him off guard and helps him regain his own composure.

"You're in heat," he says again, calmly. "You're body wants to mate. It happens a few times a year and I guess with avoiding the apocalypse and everything else that happened, I forgot to prepare you for this."

Cas's hand leaves his wrist and grabs his shirt, yanking him closer.

Dean's hit with a new, very fresh smack of _Cas_ and _heat_ and _sexnowpleaseyes_. This time, he's the one who grunts. Wants to cry at the unfairness of the situation as his alpha pouts (it's more of a bitch then Dean will ever admit) and demands to know why it can't have this splayed out, needy beta.

But he manages to choke that back and presses a chaste kiss to Cas's forehead because he just can't help himself and he's all kinds of touch-needy right now, even if he can't get off, he can still touch, you know, as a friend. So he keeps his hands above Cas's shoulders (that seems safe) and tells Cas again. "You're going to need to touch yourself. Takes the edge off. Can't do anything but ride this heat out, and later, when it's over, we'll make sure it doesn't happen again," Dean promises and tries to smile.

Cas starts writhing again. Dean can feel the rise and fall of the mattress as his body seeks _something hard to fuck itself on_ and Dean swallows roughly, shoves that thought out of his mind.

"How long will it last, Dean?" Cas asks, fingers still knotted up in the hunter's shirt.

"About twelve hours."

_"Fuck_," Cas says, and arches his back and throat and, well, emphasizes the whole word with his body and yeah.

Dean's desperate attempt to not get hard just went right out the window and he shifts a little so his poor trapped cock isn't rubbing itself raw against his zipper.

The world just got all kinds of unfair on the man who saved it.

"I know, I know, Cas. Shh, it's okay," Dean says and pushes another gentle kiss into Cas's hair but his friend keeps panting, still looks so lost and frustrated and a little bit frightened.

"Please. Please, I don't want to anymore, Dean. Please," he says and the begging, the motherfucking begging, is going to be Dean's end.

"Okay," Dean says and catches Cas's wrist, pulls it off his shirt and gently nips at the skin there. Can't help it.

And man, oh man, does he taste good. Like fresh baked donuts and powered sugar and honey-glazed heat and okay. Dean might have some internal issues where sex and food get snagged up together in his head but being starved for both as a teenager left him with a couple of fetishes he doesn't want to talk about.

"You have to," Dean starts. Stops. "Cas?"

Cas has his eyes closed and doesn't make any sort of response, but bites on his lips, pushes his hips back into the bed.

"Cas, can you hear me?" Dean asks.

The ex-angel opens his eyes again. "Yes, Dean. Help me."

"I'm going to, baby, okay?"

_Baby?_ Where the _fuck_ did that come from?

Dean shakes it off and starts over. "Do you trust me?" he asks.

"Yes, yes, yes, Dean," Cas says, all breathy-moany, hot and Dean could get used to that, yeah…

Wait, that is not helpful. He gets back on track.

"Okay. You can stop me at any point you get uncomfortable, okay, Cas?"

Cas nods, the hollow in his throat collecting a tiny pool of sweat that Dean wants to drink down like expensive liquor.

Dean keeps his gaze in Cas's eyes. That's respect. That's the kind of alpha man he is, while one hand still holds Cas's and the other gently runs down the hard line of the ex-angel's body to the waistband of his boxers and carefully slips a finger inside.

Holy hell, his body his hot. Practically a line of fire under Dean's touch and he has to focus, focus, you asshole, to keep himself from just touching him fucking everywhere. Wants to feel how soft and warm and pliant that flesh can be, but, no.

In one swift movement that he tries really hard not to think for, he manages to tug Cas's boxers off and, without needing to be told, Cas kicks them completely free of his legs and Dean is not looking, so not looking.

He bites the inside of his cheek so hard in the effort to keep himself from looking that he almost bleeds but manages to get it under control.

His friend needs help, even if it is awkward and he is never, ever, ever going to be able to look at Cas the same way again, but, come on, cut him some slack. Cas's never been through heat before and never went through any of the hella awkward sex-ed classes the public school system force-feeds ten year olds and, aside from that awkward one time they left a DVD out, he knows Cas has never watched a porn and doesn't even know where to start.

Completely SOL.

Which should not crank Dean's gears that much harder but, fuck, it does. And he actually gives a little grunt, which, luckily, Cas does not notice.

"You gotta, you gotta," Dean starts. Can't actually make himself make the words as he guides Cas's hand down between his own legs and he sees the moment Cas figures out _what is happening_ and those blue eyes pull open so wide Dean's afraid he might strain something.

"Dean?" Cas says, real hesitantly, but Dean hushes him. Kisses his jaw and just eases two of Cas's own fingers into the slick heat of his body.

Gets a little of the slippery lubricant on his own fingers in the process and it takes _a lot_ of self control to not pull his hand to his face and lick the stuff off because, fucking hell, does he want a taste. Seriously. He deserves a metal for not doing that.

"I… uhh… ohh," Cas grunts, closes his eyes and his hips are doing that thing again only now Dean has given them something to fuck back on so all his little noises are from pleasure instead of frustration and it's causing this pretty pink blush to climb delicately over Cas's pale throat like lace. A lace that Dean wants to tangle his teeth in and bite free.

This is monumentally unfair, Dean decides. He uses his hand against Cas's wrist to encourage him to push in and out and then carefully removes his hand, wipes it on the bedspread and adamantly _does not_ suck on his fingers like the horny teenager that Cas's heat has turned him into.

"That. Yes, Dean. You're right," Cas says, voice high and breathless, eyes closed.

There is a long, long moment in which Cas says nothing else and the room is filled with his breathy little grunts, the sound of his feet skidding across the sheets for traction and the slick sound of him fucking himself down on his own hand.

In his head, Dean tries to recite Latin to distract himself, but he couldn't remember a verse of it right now even if a demon appeared in the room with them.

His alpha is going on a petulant internal rant about not being allowed to knot this needy little beta, but he tells it to shut up.

"Dean, Dean," Cas says in time to his thrusts, slitting open his eyes again. "It's not… Still. Something. Dean?"

"I know," Dean says, shutting him up before he hurts himself and climbing up onto the bed. "I know, baby," he coos.

"Please," Cas says again and yeah, no way in hell Dean is ever getting used to that.

Carefully, Dean pushes Cas up so he can crawl behind him and rest the former angel in the V of his legs, back to chest.

Cas let his hand slip free and grabs at Dean's knee and Dean temporarily hates himself for never wearing shorts as he watches the slick of Cas's natural lubricant get wasted on his jeans.

"Babe, you gotta," Dean starts, grabbing Cas's other hand and (keeping that fucking alpha inside of him in check) nudges it toward Cas's neglected, weeping erection. Wraps Cas's pretty hand around it, under his own hand, and stripes it down the length twice.

Cas grunts, something that sounds like it was going to be a word but got lost somewhere, and his hand clings tighter to Dean's knee.

"Shhh. Let go," Dean instructs. His own hard-on pressing into Cas's spine, but he doesn't seem to mind as he gasps and thrusts into his hand.

His other hand finally remembers what it was doing and sinks between his splayed legs and gets back on track.

Instinct kicks in and Cas grinds down on his own hand, fucking up into his own fist and… Dean should let go.

He really should. He got things started. He should let go now and let Cas do his thing and keep some of his modesty. Some semblance of normalcy in their relationship.

But his hand isn't listening to him and his alpha is positively sniggering over it (he tells it to shut up but it's not listening to him. If it can't knot this beta, it'll settle for making this beta come hard).

Instead he pushes his nose into the sweat-slick hair behind Cas's ear and breathes deep. "Twist a little at the end," Dean says and guides Cas hand. He smiles into his friend's shoulder when Cas gives an appreciative little gasp and does it again of his own accord.

"Dean. Dean, this is… yes," Cas says. The friction of him writhing back against Dean is doing a lot more than he wants to own up to towards getting his own orgasm, but this isn't about him. It's about Cas and helping Cas deal with being human and all the good and bad and great that comes with it.

Dean'll worry about how badly this fucks him over later. Much later. When Cas isn't in heat and pressing against him and filling the air with intoxicating pheromones that makes his blood turn into a cocktail of _yes _and _please_ and _sex_. Later, when Cas is in place he can consent and accuse.

Dean is now just along for the ride, keeping his hand on Cas's, but Cas is running the show. He's speeding up and his hips swiveling down into his own fingers harder (fuck that is so hot, Dean's got his wanking fantasies sorted for the next month or six) and his chest is hitching, these high little chirps like a baby bird, sometimes tangling Dean's name into the mix until he finally, finally, _finally_, goes ridge and lets out a sound like he's dying and comes hard over his hand.

It's warm and thick and, again, Dean has to almost physically struggle to not put his hand in his mouth and suck the taste of Cas off his skin.

That is still a not okay. They need to talk about this before Dean can swallow his come.

Instead, he wipes his hand off on his jeans (fucking jeans) and gently lays his hand on Cas's knee where it seems nonchalant and as non-sexual as possible after what just went down.

Cas hums. Buzzed out and pleased. Lets his hand slip out and it finds it's way across the bed and to grab ahold of Dean's hand. Holds on tight. So tight Dean punches out an exhale harder than he meant.

The ex-angel pushes further back into Dean, finally going lax and releasing a new set of pheromones (fuck, Dean forgot about those) and hums again. The vibration of it doing things to Dean that are more emotional than physical and the alpha in him gets all kind of perplexed at that. _That's_ a new reaction to a beta's orgasm for him.

Dean doesn't worry about it right now. Just presses another kiss into Cas's jaw and asks, "Better?"

"Hmmmm," Cas says, like he's too blissed out to remember English, but finally finishes with. "Yeah. 's nice."

Dean chuckles. Boy's completely wasted.

He wants to warn Cas that he's going to have to do that at least once more before his heat is done (probably more, but he doesn't want to scare him yet), but he's not sure how to bring it up, so he just soaks up Cas's, well, literal heat, and comfort and how… safe he seems to feel here, pressed against Dean.

Dean can't help himself. He lays another gentle kiss on Cas – his shoulder this time – and as he's pulling back, Cas turns his face and brushes his lips along Dean's face in a might-be-a-kiss, might-not-be-a-kiss sort of way.

"Cas," Dean warns, voice wrecked like he's been grunting even though he's pretty sure (though not completely sure) he hasn't been.

"Dean," Cas says back and does it again and yeah, definitely a kiss.

"No, Cas," Dean says, pulling back. His alpha huffs, pulls a Sam-bitch-face, and crosses its arms.

"Dean?" Cas says again, now all puzzled and that hurt look his back in his eyes and Dean wants to kiss it out like he's never wanted anything before but… but. He's not one of those alpha assholes.

"Not right now. You're not yourself, Cas."

"But," Cas starts.

"Just… Later? Cas?"

Cas stares at him.

"When you're not in heat. Okay? Until then, not on the lips," he says.

Cas glints. Devilish in a way he never was while he was an angel and says, "Okay, Dean, not on the lips."

Then bites Dean's collarbone.

Dean gasps, surprised and Cas uses the moment to gain the upper hand, tugs Dean flat against the bed and presses the hard jut of his hipbone into Dean's desperate cock. Dean comes instantly, one hand curved around Cas's skull, the other on Cas's back, pressing his hip down into his body hard.

Cas hums again, lies flat and limp across Dean's chest. Listens as Dean's heartbeat comes down.

"I may be new to this," Cas says, lays his palm over Dean's heart. "Being human thing, but, I know what I want."

Then he kisses Dean in a way that makes him realize his alpha's got competition for control over his body.

And that's all right.


End file.
